So some backstory for this story. I was allowed to partake in an ongoing pathfinder game with a heavy pirate theme. At the same time however, I was working quite a bit of overtime. My previous character, as well as many of the other players characters, had died in a failed campaign prior, so we made new ones. Due to a perceived lack of sleep I designed a character I thought would work fine for simplicities sake.
I got my DM's permission to create a Bloody Skeleton Warrior whome I named Jack the Red. For those of you who are unaware, Bloody Skeletons are not normally player characters but pathfinder has leveling for skeletons so their not too hard to make playable. I chose the NPC warrior class because I received almost nothing from it. Essentially, this simplified what i needed to know for those days where I was very tired, and I had ver ylittle that neaded selecting or changing at level ups. I hit things, I shot things, I soaked damage, and my fast healing,which I got for a bloody skeleton, meant the party never had to spend resources to heal me. Being an awoken undead gave me a generaous number of resistances and immunities that made me usefull for a pleyr who might not be able to stay awake, ensuring I still did my job with minimal interaction. I also did moderate to low damage, ensuring I never outshined the other players, of which we had a Wyvaran Sorcer/Wizard, A Gnome Summoner who summoned a Giant Bat, a Lycan Skinwalker Alchemist with a gun and a Robotic Dog, a very sleepy half-orc pugilist, and a half-elven cavelier with a giant elk and a dire rat.
The only real way to kill me was to bless me after my HP hit 0, or to spinkle Holy Water on me in the same way. Let's be honest, most enemies won't have the resources to do this, so I soaked damge for the entire party. I didn't ned a share of loot or magic items, I was essential the eternal red shirt, send me in to trigger traps and aggro monsters, I'll walk out fine.
Jack's personality wasn't non-existant either, I made fast friends with the party's cavelier, my character was a mighty drinker and and alcoholic (don't ask), a notorious smoker (don't ask again), had an eye patch, and at one point wore a ships wheel around his waist which he converted into a roulette table for gambling. I even wandered the ship at night holding a lantern as the night watchmen frightening the ship's resident priest, an alcholic halfling npc. Most intersting was I blew my money on the best magic item ever, a Sustaining Spoon. A spoon which when placed in an empty vessel filled it with a gray unappetizing slop with a taste and consistency of wet cardboard, but whch was suitably nuitritious to fill the bellies of any who ate of it. I tried to make use of it any time I could.
For a group of sleep derpieved and often late or absent players he was fun and made more than a few people laugh. But for the DM he could be a bit of a nightmare as he was essentially unpunishable, you can't put him in the brig, time means nothing to the undead, you can't keel-haul him, hes undead he doesnt care, you can't restrict or ban food or drink he doesn't need it and can make his own food anyway. Most punishents were unnessesary anyway as my antics rarely bothered the DM or his plans.
But his end had to come at some point. Our group had enlisted on a pirate ship and at one point we were tasked with exploring an island which turned out to be a massive tortoise. Jack and the Cavalier ended up riding it's rising head to the heavens when it awoke. Unsure of what to do as falling from such a height even into water would have killed the cavelier, but would have been little more than a nuisance to me. I though of what I had, I had a blunderbuss, scratch that, I had a Thundering Blunderbuss which I had paid for earlier. I asked the Cavelier if he trusted me. Hestiantly he said he did.
I grabbed the Cavelier and we jumped from the head of the rising Tortoise and fell down to the sea, my DM let me make a Dexterity saving throw to maneuver the gun, Nat 20.
With a thundering report the water plumed and caught our fall, we were unharmed, but the wake of the tortoise as it moved churned the sea, our cavelier made it back to the ship, but I was swept under the sea, I didn't make it back to the ship in time and though my character lost at the the bottom of the sea. Lost but not dead, I'd catch up withthem later.
Thankfully, the cavelier told the captain what had happened and he called for a full stop of the sailing vessel enough for me to grab the anchor and return, but the anchor caught something else. As I returned tot he ship, and removed my head to pour our all the seawater, the anchor rasied up a frozen chunk of something. Something that made everyone on board, including a few of the players nervous. Inside the ice was some form of eldritch abomination, the kind found in lovecraftian horror.
Our party had fought aboleths before but for some reason this creature struck fear into Jack's non-existant heart more than anything else. The captain ordered it be thawed and then I was elected to talk with it. One member of our party had a magical hat that let them understand any spoken or written language, it didn't work so well with elder speech.
The captain was amused by the creature that had emerged from the ice, a creature which had spent a bit of time running it's tendrills through my characters skull out of curiosity as I shakily held my blunderbuss in it's direction. He ordered I shoot it and take what it had, but out of fear of the creature I flat out refused. The result was a swift and somewhat unwarrented punishment. A curse was immediately levied against me and rendered me paralyzed. I was dismembered and each piece of me was placed in a cask of holy water (blessed by the ships priest), which was then sealed. I lost 4/5 of my health in the first round, it only took two more rounds to kill my unkillable character. And as an undead he cannot be returned to unlife there is no more me.
I handed my character sheet over to my DM, not entirely sad. I enjoyed playing my character alot but his time needed to come. The alchemist bailed after Jack was killed, openly objecting to his murder, which forces us to both make new characters. Our DM moderately regrets his descision but I assured him there are no hard feelings. It was fun while it lasted.
[zombify_post]
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